


Big Man

by katling



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Clint friendly, Fury knows how to be something other than a manipulative ass, Gen, Not Steve Friendly, Team Tony, he's actually observant in this one
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-18
Updated: 2018-12-14
Packaged: 2019-03-06 09:46:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13408638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katling/pseuds/katling
Summary: What would have happened if Tony had left a certain glib answer in his pocket and went for something a little more badass.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is was inspired by Tony's reaction in this scene in the movie, where he almost seems to realise that something isn't quite right (here he does realise), and [Xythia's comment](http://archiveofourown.org/comments/145046193) on Kizmet's fic, [What Steve Knew.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/13385829)
> 
> I made Fury a bit more observant that he is in the movies (seriously how does he _not_ realise that SHIELD has been infiltrated earlier - hasn't he been there for decades????) and a bit less 'manipulate anything and everything that moves'. He's also way more pragmatic. This is the Fury who called Tony about the nuke but present all the time.
> 
> Also, it is not Steve friendly, which is why I tagged it as that.

“Big man in a suit of armour. Take that away, what are you?”

A glib answer sat on the end of Tony’s tongue but as he looked at Steve Rogers, he found himself swallowing it down and what came out of his mouth was something much harder and harsher.

“The guy who _built_ the suit. In a _cave_. In _Afghanistan_. From a box of scraps. While being held captive and tortured.”

Dead silence reigned in the aftermath of his statement. He would have regretted the last bit but he was pretty sure that Fury and his minions already had a fair idea of what had happened to him, even without him actually telling them. They probably knew far better than he did what group like the Ten Rings did to their prisoners.

He could see the shock in Steve’s eyes but there was something else there as well, something darker and angrier. In a flash, Tony recognised it. He _had_ seen before it, after all, in the eyes of business rivals, especially when he’d first taken over as CEO when he was twenty-one and they’d all thought they could dominate him and get him to kowtow to them. Steve was shocked and angry that he hadn’t backed down. That he hadn’t deferred to the opinion of the great Captain America. That he’d dared to challenge him and defy him instead of bowing and scraping and apologising for even breathing, let alone being a person in his own right.

He immediately wonder wondered if he’d seen that right or whether he’d made a mistake, because this _was_ Captain America after all, but then Rogers spoke again.

“I know guys with none of what you’d been handed on a silver platter that are worth ten of you. I've seen the footage. The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you.”

It was such a _nonsensical_ thing to say, especially in the wake of what Tony had said, but now that his Captain America blinkers were gone, Tony could see the tactic for what it was – a power play. Rogers was ignoring what he’d said and trying to redirect the conversation to gain the upper hand so he could browbeat Tony into doing what he said.

Tony could feel something inside himself wanting to rise up and take the bait. To turn this into a fight, verbal, physical or otherwise. Which… wasn’t the way he operated. He’d been in this situation before and he never fought back. He tossed out some quips and on the odd occasion verbally eviscerated the idiot in front of him but he never went looking for a fistfight. His years being the smaller, younger, scrawnier kid in school and college had taught him how useless that tactic was, even with the training Aunt Peggy had given him. Which meant that whatever was goading him into picking a fight wasn’t him.

He whirled around and stared at the sceptre. “Son of a bitch,” he murmured.

“Don’t turn your back on me, Stark,” Rogers said, anger now lacing his voice rather than the contempt that had been there before.

Tony strode over towards the sceptre, deftly evading the hand that had been coming down on his shoulder with an ease that spoke of experience. Everyone else was just staring at him now. He could feel the weight of their eyes on his back. He stared down at the sceptre and the glowing blue stone in it, his mind whirring.

“Huh,” he finally said. “Brucie bear, want to bring those containment field anchors over here?”

No one but Bruce moved as he brought over the anchors Tony had asked for. Tony quickly set them up around the sceptre and gestured for Bruce to turn it on. The moment they hummed into life, the atmosphere in the room abruptly changed. 

Bruce shook his head and his eyes widened. Fury and Natasha looked unaffected but Tony could see the speculation in their eyes. Thor was frowning but Rogers… he was still glaring at Tony with frustrated anger.

“Stark?” Fury barked. “What the hell?”

“I think Loki’s been playing a game with us,” Tony said, looking at Fury and pointedly ignoring Rogers. “I thought capturing him was way too easy. He wanted us to have his little glowstick so it could screw with our minds. This containment field works to neutralise the sceptre’s energy.”

Fury took it in his stride, not even asking why Tony had rigged something like that up, just accepting it as Tony thinking ahead even for possibilities he couldn’t have known would be needed. “What’s Loki’s end game?”

Tony hummed and tapped one finger on his bottom lip. “He wanted us to be distracted but distracted from what?”

“Barton,” Natasha said sharply.

“He stole a quinjet from a SHIELD base before we could get the word out,” Fury added with a growl. He activated his comm unit. “Hill! Get the radar operators to shift to our frequencies. Watch out for the quinjet that was stolen.”

They didn’t hear Hill’s response but Fury then faced them and Tony saw something in his eyes that told him that Fury had seen _everything_. He’d seen Rogers’ reaction and he was seeing the mulish, angry look that Rogers was directing at Tony even now. What’s more Fury had come to his own conclusions about what to do.

“Stark!” he said but before he could say anything else, the scanner that was searching for the tesseract beeped.

Bruce hurried over to it and looked down at the screen. His eyes widened and he turned to Tony. “Tony…” he said in horror. Tony immediately hurried over to join him but before he could do more than look at the screen…

BOOM!

The explosion rocked the helicarrier and alarms and sirens went off. The floor underneath Tony and Bruce caved in, sending them falling down onto the floor below. Tony was momentarily stunned but when he gathered his wits, he saw Bruce on his hands and knees not far away, green rippling over his skin, grunting and growling as he struggled to contain the Hulk. Tony didn’t even think twice before crawling over to him and throwing an arm over his shoulders.

“Hey, Brucie bear,” he said urgently. “As much as I’d like to meet the big guy and let him smash whoever did this to us, we kind of need your big beautiful brain right now.”

The green kept rippling over Bruce’s skin and Tony took a gamble.

“Hey, big guy,” he said, directly into Bruce’s ear. “Hulk. I know you’re scared and want out, that you think Bruce is in danger and needs to be protected and yeah, you’re not entirely wrong but we need Bruce’s brain right now. If I’m right – and I always am – you’ll get a chance to smash later, okay?”

He didn’t really expect it to work. He was extrapolating off several things that had been in Bruce’s file and things that the man had said while they’d talked and had no idea if he’d gotten them right. And the big guy wasn’t known for his level head when he thought he and Bruce were in danger. But he thought he might be right and he had to try.

Much to his surprise, it did work. The green rippling over Bruce’s skin faded and the man was finally able to relax.

“Stark! If you’re done with your Hulk whispering, we need you on the engines.”

Tony looked up at Fury. “How nice to hear your dulcet tones bellowing at me, Nicky. Everyone okay?”

Fury scowled at him but there wasn’t much heat behind it. “Everyone’s fine. Engines.”

Fury disappeared and Tony rolled his eyes. “Sir, yes sir.” He turned to Bruce. “You okay?”

Bruce nodded a little shakily. “Yeah, For now anyway. Tony…”

“Yeah, I know,” Tony said grimly. “I saw it just before the explosion. Look. Let’s just… save the helicarrier now, get to New York later. Can you go and keep an eye on our resident god? I don’t think he’s going to stay where he is and who better to stop him than you and the big guy.”

Bruce didn’t look overly happy but he nodded anyway. They parted then and the next few hours were lost in a haze of fighting, getting to New York and finally stopping the Chitauri invasion. Bruce hadn’t been able to stop Loki from escaping after the apparent god had triggered him into transforming but he had joined them in New York and the Hulk had been instrumental in the battle, had stopped Loki by curbstomping him into Tony’s floor and saved Tony’s life.

It was only when they had Loki in custody and Fury, Hill and Coulson appeared to manage things that Tony noticed some differences in the way he was treated by the SHIELD contingent.

“Stark,” Fury said, striding up to him in a billow of black leather jacket. Coulson and Hill were trailing after him and not a single one of them spared a glance for Captain America. It was odd enough that Tony’s normal glib answer got lost somewhere.

“Yeah?”

“How big a perimeter do we need to establish?”

Tony blinked then answered the question seriously since there was no hint of condescension or manipulation. It was kind of surprising to find that Fury could do that but then he remembered the missile. Fury hadn’t played games then, just contacted him and told him the problem, clearly with the confidence that Tony would be able to solve it. 

“J? Put up a map.” A holographic map of Manhattan sprung into view between himself and Fury. Tony gestured at it. “We managed to keep everything contained to the general vicinity of the Tower but JARVIS is still tracking any strays that might have escaped us during the battle or as they were all collapsing in a heap after I blew up the… the mothership or command ship or whatever it was.”

Fury nodded. “Coulson.”

“On it,” Coulson said quietly before stepping over to one side and talking on his comms.

“How many ships did they have?” Fury now asked.

Tony grimaced. “A lot. Thor’s right. We have definitely got _someone’s_ attention and they’re coming in force.”

“Did you stop them?”

Tony almost bristled defensively but he stopped himself when he realised that there was no accusation in Fury’s tone, just enquiry. He wasn’t blaming Tony for not stopping all of them, he just wanted the intel.

“I aimed the missile for the biggest ship there,” he said. “But there were a _lot_ of others. Plus a ton of those space whale things. I think most of what they’d sent through were those speeder things. Which makes sense given the size of the portal.”

“So the… speeders were meant to keep us busy while the portal was widened,” Hill mused.

“That would be my guess,” Tony said. He still felt a little bewildered by Fury and Hill’s sudden change in behaviour but he wasn’t sure he wanted to go into right now. He was tired and sore and he knew that if he started asking questions about it, he was going to offend someone or work himself up and neither of those options were ideal right now.

“Do you have any vision of what you saw through the portal?” Fury asked.

“Uh, J?”

“Yes, sir, Director Fury,” JARVIS replied, as calm, cool and polite as ever. “The main suit cameras failed at the same time the life support did but there are some standalone cameras that run off their own batteries that continued recording.”

Fury nodded. “I’d like your report and analysis and as much footage you can provide as soon as possible.” He gestured with his head towards the gathered Avengers. “I’ll take this lot back to SHIELD and I’d like to speak to you sometime this week about the Avengers Initiative.”

Tony gave Fury a long hard look, trying to figure out what the man meant by that, but he was as inscrutable as ever and this time, Tony couldn’t read his eyes at all. Even a quick glance at Hill and Coulson told him nothing. If he wanted to know, he was going to have to turn up.

“Right,” he finally said. “I’ll do that.” He turned to the Avengers and for once, forwent the image of the showman. He was too damn tired and slightly confused to play the role for them. “Though I do have spare guest bedrooms if anyone wants something more comfortable than the SHIELD barracks.”

He skipped over Rogers’ disapproving glare and Natasha’s neutral stare and instead arched an eyebrow at Bruce and Clint. He figured Bruce might want some place to stay other than SHIELD and was proven correct when Bruce gave him a small smile and nodded.

“I’ll… uh, take you up on that,” Bruce said, sounding as tired as Tony felt. “No offence, Fury, but I’ve had about enough of SHIELD for now.”

Fury seemed to know when to let a fight go. “None taken, Dr Banner. We’d like your report as well and if you wouldn’t mind joining Dr Stark on the analysis, we’d appreciate that too.”

Bruce nodded and then Clint stepped forward. He seemed tense and there was an oddly fragile look in his eyes that made Tony want to wince. It must be just sinking in how much damage he’d caused while being one of Loki’s flying monkeys and he looked a little like he wanted to curl up in a ball for a year and hide from everyone.

“That include me?” Clint asked, his voice slightly hoarse.

“Sure,” Tony said with deceptive idleness. He could feel Coulson’s gaze on him but he didn’t spare the man a glance. “Mi casa es su casa and all that.”

The weight of Coulson’s gaze softened and now he spared the man a glance. Coulson gave him a small nod and let Tony see the gratitude on his face. Obviously Coulson was well aware of not only Clint’s problems but also what he might face back at SHIELD.

He turned back in time to see Natasha whisper something in Clint’s ear. The Black Widow then gave Tony a small nod and smile before Fury gathered up Coulson, Hill and the remainder of the Avengers and Loki. Tony watched them go then turned to Clint and Bruce.

“Rooms!” he said with as much of a grin as he could muster, then he looked Bruce up and down. “And clothes for Brucie bear because as delightful as the view is, designer rags are not in fashion this year.”

Bruce smiled with a sort of fond exasperation that Tony kind of liked and Clint gave a small, shaky bark of laughter. Tony ushered them towards the lift, babbling a little about showers and comfortable beds and how JARVIS would get them anything they needed and not to worry about the cost because what the hell else was he going to do with his money other than help people.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony hates all this cloak and dagger stuff but he's also getting a sneaking feeling that something's going down in SHIELD.
> 
> Or, otherwise known as, what happens after the battle of New York in this changed universe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I have a vague idea of where I'm going with this... so yay! :D

It was four days after the battle of New York when Tony fronted up to SHIELD headquarters for a meeting with Fury. He’d much rather have been assisting with the rescue and recovery efforts in the city but Fury had insisted. He’d sent off his report and his and Bruce’s analysis of the video footage from beyond the portal the day after the battle, just before meeting with Thor to see him and Loki off. Natasha and Coulson had been there from SHIELD and Bruce and Clint had come along as well. There had been no sign of Rogers. After Thor and Loki had disappeared home, Tony had once again invited Bruce and Clint to stay. He’d been delighted when Bruce accepted and surprised when Clint had. He’d seen Natasha and Clint talking while he and Bruce had been handing over the tesseract and he’d expected the man to head back to SHIELD.

So Clint had returned to the tower with him and Bruce but they hadn’t really seen the archer all that much since then. JARVIS had said that Clint was mostly eating and sleeping but that he felt Clint might welcome something to distract him from his thoughts. Tony had made a mental note to suggest a movie night to Clint and Bruce when he got home but he also suspected he might be cornered by Coulson at some point while he was at SHIELD, to talk about Clint’s welfare. He would be happy to let that happen because he honestly had no idea what to do with a moping Clint. He assumed some sort of therapy was required but he was really the last person to be talking about that with anyone given his own aversion to it. He generally tried not to be a wilful hypocrite these days.

Thoughts of Clint disappeared from his mind when he saw that Maria Hill was waiting for him in SHIELD’s foyer. For once, she didn’t have that mild expression of disdain she seemed to reserve for him. It was a nice change but it also made him suspicious.

“Mr Stark,” Hill said. “If you’ll come with me?”

Tony nodded and walked alongside her down the corridor. SHIELD agents passed them left and right in varying degrees of busy. Tony wasn’t surprised by that. SHIELD was assisting with the clean-up, taking all alien artefacts and remains into custody, which meant they were getting into assorted shit fights with the NYPD, the CIA, the FBI, Homeland Security and various other organisations Tony hadn’t bothered to sort out. He was fairly he’d seen the ATF out there at one point, though what they were after was anyone’s business.

The shit fights were doing more than just creating paperwork, they were bringing SHIELD into the public’s eye and Tony had to wonder how Fury was handling that. He’d gotten the impression that Fury didn’t much like the spotlight and that was what was being rapidly shone on his organisation.

Hill showed him into a conference room where Fury was sitting at one end of the long table. Coulson was next to him on one side and Hill moved to take a place on the other side. Natasha was sitting a few seats down from Coulson so Tony dropped into the chair opposite hers. He nodded to her then raised an eyebrow at Fury.

“Okay, here I am. What’s up? This can’t be the official debrief because we seem to lacking some of the people who should be involved in that.”

“No, it’s not,” Fury said. “That will occur in a couple of days, once Dr Banner has had a chance to settle down and I’ve… dealt with an issue here at SHIELD.”

Tony raised an eyebrow at that last bit and from the brief sad puppy look that drifted across Coulson’s face, he suspected the ‘issue’ had something to do with Rogers.

“Then what do you need me for?”

Fury slid a folder along the table. Tony eyed it with suspicion before pulling it towards him and opening it up. He wasn’t entirely surprised to find papers inside making him an official Avenger – he’d expected that, it seemed the logical next step in whatever game Fury was playing – but what he was surprised about was that those papers named him as Team Leader.

“Uh,” he said, pointing at that particular bit. “You seem to have made a mistake here.”

“There are no mistakes in those papers,” Fury said.

Tony narrowed his eyes as he stared at Fury, trying to figure out what was going on. “I thought Rogers was your blue eyed boy, both figuratively and literally. And I thought I wasn’t recommended.”

Fury gave a frustrated huff, as if he’d expected this kind of pushback from Tony, didn’t like it but knew he had brought it upon himself and had to deal with it. “We were wrong. On both counts.”

Tony wasn’t sure how to respond to that and this time the glib answer _did_ roll off his tongue. “Come again? I didn’t hear you the first time.”

“We were wrong,” Fury said in a tone that advised Tony not to push his luck any further.

“ _I_ was wrong,” Natasha said through gritted teeth and when Tony arched an eyebrow at her, she continued with reluctance. “I didn’t look beyond what I wanted to see.”

“Uhuh,” Tony said carefully. Natasha Romanov had struck him as the kind of person who didn’t admit to mistakes and seeing her do so now made him wary rather than vindicated. He turned back to Fury. “And what prompted all of this? Because this all seems a little sudden.”

Fury snorted. “You think I didn’t see what was going on during that little brouhaha in the lab?”

Tony blinked at Fury’s use of the word ‘brouhaha’ then forced himself to focus on what he was saying and not get distracted by a tangent. “And what do you think you saw?”

“I saw you figure out what none of the rest of us did. That the sceptre was influencing us. I saw you overcome it, disengage from your little fight with Rogers and find a solution.”

“Right,” Tony said slowly.

“I also saw the way Rogers was determined to pick a fight based on information that was not intended for him,” Fury continued.

Tony’s eyes narrowed. “What now?”

“That’s an internal matter,” Fury said. There was a dangerous look in his eye but there was something about his expression that made Tony think he might be getting a little extracurricular visit from Fury at the Tower sometime in the next day or two.

Tony gave the barest quirk of an eyebrow and looked down at the rest of the papers in the folder, reading them through quickly but thoroughly. “Huh. You want me to set up shop at the Tower?”

“The Tower or whatever place suits you best. We would prefer some separation between SHIELD and the Avengers,” Fury said blandly. “SHIELD still needs to operate under the radar. The Avengers will draw too much attention to us.”

Tony hummed and nodded at the highly plausible excuse Fury had given him and noted that the sentence that stretched from the end of page seven to the top of page eight of the papers was… strange. It made sense and he suspected most people wouldn’t have batted an eyelid at it but it was still strange. Almost like they were two different sentences that had been smashed together. He got a sneaking suspicion that Fury’s extracurricular visit would also include some missing pages and possibly a private request or two.

He kept reading and on the last page was the suggested initial roster and it was the significant name that was missing that made his eyebrows go up. He looked up and met Fury’s eye then glanced over to Coulson and Hill. They were all giving him their best poker faces so he glanced over at Natasha. She was also wearing a decent poker face but there was something about her that made Tony feel she was unsettled by something.

He looked down at the list with its notable absentee then very deliberately pulled a pen out of his jacket and signed the papers with a flourish. Doing so sent a shiver down his spine considering his suspicions about missing pages but he didn’t hesitate. He wasn’t sure he was the best option for Team Leader, despite his years as CEO… or perhaps _because_ of them, but he also knew Fury wouldn’t offer this to him lightly. And it was quite obvious from the sober expressions and the lack of any baiting or snide comments that this wasn’t being offered to him in an effort to see him fail. It almost felt like Fury was handing over the Avengers in order to safeguard them from some threat only he could see.

He closed the file after he’d signed and handed it to Maria Hill. She took it with a nod then she got to her feet. Fury and Natasha joined her and the three of them left the room. Tony raised an eyebrow at Coulson as he tucked his pen back in his jacket.

“Walk with me, Mr Stark,” Coulson said calmly.

Tony got up and joined Coulson. They left the room and started walking down the corridor, Coulson making what was essentially small talk about the progress of the rescue and recovery operations around the Tower. It was only when the door of Coulson’s office closed behind them and the man pushed a button under the rim of his desk that he allowed the small talk to end.

Tony looked around as the air in the room seemed to become just very faintly stifled. “Huh.” He looked at Coulson. “Jamming tech?”

Coulson nodded and gestured for Tony to sit down. “Director Fury thinks it’s necessary but we can’t use it for long.”

Tony’s eyes narrowed. “What the hell’s going on, Agent?”

“Director Fury would like to come and see you at the Tower tomorrow evening,” Coulson replied. “He’ll explain more then.”

“Right,” Tony said suspiciously. “I’m getting a really sinking feeling about this, you know?”

“You read the papers,” Coulson said.

“Yeah?”

“Fury will explain more tomorrow.”

Tony scowled. “I hate this cloak and dagger shit.”

Coulson hesitated. “It’s necessary.”

“Fine,” Tony said with a wave of his hand. “So what did you want to talk to me about?”

“Barton.”

Tony sighed and slouched in his chair a bit. “Thought so. I’m not exactly sure what to do with him.”

“What’s he doing?”

“Moping in his room,” Tony replied. “JARVIS says he’s eating and sleeping. I was considering coaxing him out for a movie night with Bruce tonight.”

“Disney movies,” Coulson said.

“Huh?”

“He’s a sucker for Disney movies,” Coulson said. “Try Brave. He loves the archery in it. Says it’s one of the most accurate representations of archery he’s seen in a movie.”

“Okay,” Tony said then he frowned. “But he’s going to need more than that.”

Coulson slid a card across the desk. “That’s the name and number of the one therapist that he’ll actually speak to. She’s not SHIELD but she’s former CIA so she knows the life. She won’t do home visits for SHIELD but she might just do so for Tony Stark.”

Tony took the card and arched an eyebrow at him. “And Barton doesn’t go to her?”

“He will. Reluctantly. But not for long. Not long enough in this case.”

Tony tucked the card in his pocket. “Barton’s name is on the list.”

Coulson nodded. “He’s unconventional but very good.” He hesitated. “And he may struggle within SHIELD now.”

Tony stared at him, a scowl growing on his face. “He was mind controlled.”

“I know,” Coulson said with a sigh. “But people don’t always react logically to grief and stress. With the Avengers, he has a chance to re-establish himself.” He paused and looked Tony square in the eye. “And I think he’ll do well under your leadership. You’ll actually care about him.”

Tony twitched. “What makes you think that?”

Coulson’s smile was so faint it might not have been there. “You haven’t tossed him to the wolves.”

“He let me call him Legolas,” Tony said blithely, not entirely comfortable with the direction the conversation was taking.

Coulson seemed aware of that and he let that part of the conversation drop. “Fury doesn’t know what time he’ll be able to get to the Tower but he suspects it will be late.”

Tony recognised the change in tack as what it was – a clean end to the conversation, one that would be picked up by Fury the next evening. He got to his feet and when Coulson also rose and held out his hand, Tony took it. They shook hands and then the SHIELD agent lead him out to the front door. As Tony started to get into his car, Coulson spoke up again.

“Nice car,” he said admiringly. “I think it needs a clean though.”

Tony hesitated for a moment but Coulson’s bland expression was a masterwork. “I’ll tell Happy you said that,” he said with a smirk before getting in and driving off, making a mental note to have JARVIS and Happy check the car for bugs. He also decided he was going to have JARVIS check him for bugs too. Coulson had him properly paranoid now but there was something about the man’s attitude right now that made him wonder if it really was paranoia or whether someone really was out to get them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tune in next chapter to find out just what is going on with Steve? What is Fury up to? And will Clint come out of his room to watch Merida fire arrows at things?


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay, more of this - in which Tony and Clint bond, Clint is sneakier then he seems and Fury makes a home visit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your comments and enthusiasm for this! It's very motivating. That being said, I do plan to continue this but I will probably have a somewhat erratic update schedule with it. But I do have some ideas of where I'm going with certain parts of this, I just have to work out how that impacts on where the MCU has gone and what these changes might do to that.

The end credits for Brave were still running when Bruce got up and stretched. He picked up his empty tea cup and smiled at Tony and Clint.

“I think I might go to bed.”

Tony waved goodnight and Clint nodded and they continued watching the credits. Tony eyed Clint for a moment then he pulled the card Coulson had given him out of his pocket.

“So… Coulson gave me this today.”

Clint look over and grimaced. “It’s Stella, isn’t it?”

Tony nodded. “Yeah.”

“I hate going to her office,” Clint said sourly, hunching in on himself.

Tony watched him carefully then he deliberately snorted. “I’m Tony Stark. People come to me.”

Clint turned slowly away from the TV and looked at him. He seemed caught between being amused and dubious. “Even shrinks?”

“I’ve never tried it with a shrink,” Tony admitted. Which was only kind of a lie. He’d never asked a shrink to come to him before now but when he’d called this one up earlier today, she’d prevaricated for a moment then agreed. “But I’m sure if I asked really nicely and gave her a swanky office here, she’d say yes.”

Clint curled up a little more. “I can’t come back unless it do this, right?”

“Weelllll,” Tony said, drawing the word out almost ridiculously. “You’ve been shifted over to the Avengers roster and they’ve put me in charge of all of that and I’d be a pretty massive hypocrite if I pulled that kind of bullshit on you, given my… pretty shaky mental health. But on the other hand, you were mind controlled and I have no idea what that does to your head but I can’t imagine it’s very good so I’m guessing seeing a therapist would help?”

Clint grumbled under his breath then his eyes narrowed. “They put you in charge?”

“Yeah, surprised me too,” Tony said. “Natasha even apologised for that personality profile thing she did. I was half-expecting her to take out my spleen while she apologised.”

That got a snort of laughter from Clint. “Yeah, she’s even less good with apologies than I am. We usually just beat the shit out of each other when we have to apologise to each other.”

Tony looked appalled, something he exaggerated a little when his initial expression made Clint snicker. “I’m a delicate civilian who values his spleen.”

Clint snorted again. “I thought you were Iron Man.”

“When it suits me,” Tony said with a smirk.

Clint sobered. “Did you see a shrink after Afghanistan?” His tone was almost challenging.

“No,” Tony admitted. “But I… don’t have a good track record with therapists. The one I went and saw after I nearly drank myself to death when I was twenty spilled the beans to the gossip rags. Thankfully we were only three sessions in so I hadn’t really told her much.” He shrugged. “I have enough trust issues as it is. That only made them worse.”

“Did she get punished?” Clint asked.

Tony shook his head. “She claimed that it was a break in and she had nothing to do with it. We couldn’t prove otherwise.” He shuddered and grimaced. “And from what I know about Obie… _Stane_ now, she may even have been telling the truth. I’m sure _he_ didn’t want me to clean up my act and actually pay attention to the business. I might have picked up on what he was doing before he learned to hide it so well.”

“I heard about the Ironmonger thing,” Clint said. “Phil was pretty amused by how well you evaded him. Not many people can do that.”

“I have been evading responsibility since I was about seven years old,” Tony said with a lofty grin. “I’m an expert at it.” He laughed. “Besides, there was something about Agent that made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. He gives the appearance of an accountant but not quite.”

Clint definitely laughed at that. “Yeah, he’s cultivated that. He’s pretty good at it.”

Tony waved the card again. “So? It was Agent who gave me this.”

Clint grimaced then he narrowed his eyes. “I will if you will.”

Tony glared at him. “What is this? Blackmail?”

“If I have to get my head sorted out to be an Avenger then shouldn’t you?” Clint replied. “What’s good for the goose and all that. Stella won’t talk and if her office is here, then no one’s going to break in, are they? ”

“I resent being compared to a gander,” Tony said then he grumbled under his fine when Clint just stared challengingly at him. “ _Fine_ , Merida. I’ll try it. I’m not promising any more than that.”

“Fair enough,” Clint said then he leaned forward and snagged the card out of Tony’s hand. “So, the Avengers, huh? I thought Rogers was going to be in charge.”

“So did I,” Tony replied, lounging back on the couch again and trying not to think about what he’d promised to do. “But he and I had a little pas de deux while you were busy being a flying monkey and Fury changed his mind.”

Clint snorted at the description of his time under mind control. “Flying monkey. I like that. Must have been a hell of a dance.”

“He tried to pick a fight and I’m not sure it was all to do with the sceptre playing with our minds,” Tony replied. “Fury’s coming round tomorrow night to give me more information.”

Clint perked up at that but there was something about his expression that sent a shiver down Tony’s spine. He decided to pay attention to whatever Clint was going to say. The man knew Fury and SHIELD better than he did, after all.

“Fury’s coming here?” Tony nodded and Clint whistled. “Where did Phil speak to you?”

Tony raised an eyebrow. “In his office.”

“With the jamming tech going?”

Tony nodded. “Yeah. Why?”

Clint frowned. “Why keep the Avengers under wraps? We’re pretty public now.”

“Fury wanted me to set up shop fairly separate from SHIELD,” Tony said. “It was pretty emphatic in the papers I sort of signed today.”

Clint’s frown deepened. “That’s weird.”

“You’re telling me,” Tony said. “There was this whole weird vibe in general going on this morning.”

Clint hesitated for a moment. “You want me around tomorrow night?”

Tony considered that. Mostly he was thinking about whether Fury would expect it or not. “Yeah,” he said slowly. “JARVIS can give you access to the vents if you want to stay out of sight. Fury will suspect you’re here anyway, I guess.”

“Yeah, probably,” Clint said. “But…” He licked his lips and shuddered. “If Coulson’s shifted me over to the Avengers now, without even talking to me, then I’m guessing I’m pretty much persona non grata at SHIELD. So, I’m guessing Fury will expect it but won’t care.”

“SHIELD’s pretty fucked up if they’re not taking into account you were mind controlled,” Tony said bluntly. 

“Yeah, well, no one ever said that a bunch of spies were anything other than dysfunctional,” Clint said unhappily.

Tony wisely changed the subject at that point and they left the subject of SHIELD alone until the next evening.

***

Tony was just dicking around with various designs for new bows and arrows when JARVIS announced Fury’s arrival. Unlike other times he’d seen the SHIELD Director, Fury came up quite openly and without messing with Tony’s AI or security systems. A couple of quick taps from above before Fury got there told him that Clint was up in the vents but Tony didn’t toss his tablet aside until Fury had actually walked in.

“So how much cloak and dagger shit do I have to put up with before you get to the point?” he asked as he got to his feet.

“Not much,” Fury said. “I can’t be out of sight for long.”

Tony eye’s narrowed. “Alright. What the fuck is going on?”

Fury pulled some papers out of his coat and placed them on the kitchen bench. Tony walked over and picked them up and had his suspicions about the stuff he’d signed yesterday confirmed.

“You knew there were pages missing,” Fury said. It wasn’t a question.

Tony nodded as he read through the _full_ document. “Yeah, the sentence that crossed over pages seven and eight read pretty cleanly but it was still clunky enough to get my attention.” He glanced over at Fury briefly. “But I’ve been reading business contracts since I was twenty-one. Most other people wouldn’t notice.”

“We thought you would.”

Tony nodded to himself. “So that’s why you didn’t bat an eyelid when I didn’t sign each page.”

Fury looked amused. “We deliberately left the last page with the Avengers’ roster blank of anything else for that reason. You could sign that and not commit to anything else until you’d gotten the rest of it.”

“Not that signing even that page didn’t send a shiver down my spine and make me feel like I was signing my soul away,” Tony said sourly. He finished his reading then put the papers down. “Alright. I repeat my question. What the fuck is going on? You’ve essentially handed the Avengers over to me, lock, stock and barrel. You could probably claim them back but if I fought it, a court would likely rule in my favour unless you went completely underhanded.”

“I’m aware of that,” Fury replied.

Tony scowled. “So what gives?”

“We’ve been infiltrated,” Fury replied, looking very briefly furious before he calmed down again. “I’m not sure by whom or how extensively but they got to Rogers.”

Tony stared at him for a long moment. “Got to him how?”

“I went to find the damn footage he referenced,” Fury said. “I did approve a sort of compilation of your greatest hits to be shown to him so he knew who you were beyond Howard’s son but that wasn’t what he was given.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “Don’t tell me, one or more of the sex tapes were in there.”

Fury snorted and looked amused. “Yeah. You were real flexible when you were younger.” He pointed a finger at Tony when he opened his mouth. “Don’t even think about it, Stark.”

Tony grinned at him before sobering again. “So they were trying to manipulate him to drive a wedge between us before we even began. Appeal to his Forties’ prudishness.”

“Something like that,” Fury replied. “Hill’s got him in a safe house at the moment and she and Romanov are going to try and undo the damage that’s been done and do a new assessment of his mental state. If that works, we’ll hand him over to you. I need to keep him and Barton out of the hands of whoever this is in my organisation.”

“You think his mental state isn’t great?” Tony asked.

Fury nodded. “He got the all clear from the shrinks but in hindsight, I should have queried that. No one does a seventy year time jump and comes out of it fresh as a daisy. Hill and Romanov are going to get an independent assessment of him.”

Tony nodded. “It’s not going to be good. You know that, right? I mean, he’s come out of a war zone where he lost his best friend and then the first thing that really happens to him is he gets thrown right back into one. He’s got to have PTSD up the wazoo.”

Fury gave him a spectacular bland look. “Well… you’d know.”

Tony scowled at him. “We’re talking about Rogers, not me.”

“You want him here?” Fury cocked an eyebrow at him almost challengingly.

Tony hesitated for a moment. “If they convince him that I’m not the devil incarnate, sure. JARVIS and I can put together some sort of reasonably gentle ‘here’s all the important stuff that happened in the last seventy years, now please try not to freak out’ thing for him.”

“I’ll talk to Hill and Romanov.”

Tony nodded. “You want me to do any digging about this infiltration? JARVIS is already in your system but he’s just _lightly_ in your system. I could give him the resources to dig deeper.”

Fury gave him a long, hard look then sighed. Tony grinned back at him.

“Fine,” Fury said. “Go digging but do it _carefully_ , Stark. I don’t want this group getting spooked and going to ground. I want to dig them out before they even know I’m there.”

“JARVIS will be discreet,” Tony promised. “Won’t you, J?”

“I shall be a ghost in the machine, Director Fury,” JARVIS said.

“Good,” Fury said sourly. “And I want _everything_ you dig up. I don’t care if you give it to Stark as well but I want it all.”

“Of course, Director Fury.”

Fury pointed his finger at Tony. “As for you, I don’t want you making moves against this group without running it past me first. I don’t want us tripping over each other’s feet and letting them get away.”

Tony held up both hands. “I didn’t think that’s what the Avengers were for anyway. Weren’t we for the battles ordinary people couldn’t handle?”

“Didn’t think you were listening,” Fury grumbled.

Tony opened his mouth to make a flippant comment then closed it again. When he continued it was with deadly seriousness. “I _always_ listen, Fury, even when it seems like I’m not. If you’d been paying attention when you had Natashalie snooping around my company, you would have known that.”

He found himself the subject of one of Fury’s more intense glares but he did not falter under it or turn flippant and glib. He stood his ground and faced the SHIELD Director down and while Fury didn’t back down, he did finally nod in understanding.

“You planning on signing that?” Fury said, gesturing towards the papers he’d brought with him.

Tony paused for a moment as he ran through the possibilities and potential problems in his mind, then he pulled a pen out of his pocket and carefully signed and dated each page of the document. When he was done, Fury swooped in and added his own signature to it. 

“I’ll make sure you get a copy tomorrow,” Fury replied. “Pay attention to that copy and any other paperwork I send to you. If it doesn’t have my personal signature in ink on it, don’t trust it. I don’t use printed signatures.”

“I suppose it’s not paranoia if they really are out to get you,” Tony said sourly.

Fury picked up the papers and tucked them away in his coat. “I always assume they’re out to get me.” He nodded to Tony. “Stark. Good luck.” He then looked up at the ceiling. “Barton! Stop hiding in the ceiling and eavesdropping.”

With that, Fury swept out of the room and into the lift. Once the doors closed, a vent in the roof opened and Clint dropped down onto the floor. He stared at the lift for a moment then he look over at Tony.

“Well, shit,” he said.

“That about sums it up,” Tony replied. “Also, you need to work on your stealth, vent boy.”

Clint snorted. “I knew he’d know I was there. He wanted me to know what was going on so I wouldn’t walk into anything.”

Tony frowned. “He didn’t trust me to tell you?”

Clint shook his head. “Nah. He didn’t trust me not to be an idiot unless he confirmed it was real.”

“So you really are a birdbrain?”

Clint shrugged then grinned. “They hired me for my eyes and my shooting skills, not my brains.” His grin widened. “That’s what you’re here for.”

“Cool,” Tony said blandly then he shook his head. “Come on, birdbrain. Let’s go fill Bruce in on the bad news.”

Clint perked up and bounced over to join Tony as he walked towards the lift. “Twenty bucks says he hulks out.”

(He didn’t.)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve brings entirely new definitions to the word 'stubborn', Natasha uses her wiles for the forces of good and Maria Hill tries not to strangle anyone. (It's not easy.)

“I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

Maria Hill sighed and reminded herself that this really _was_ for a good cause. Unfortunately, Steven Rogers was proving to be one of the stubbornest, most intractable, recalcitrant, pig-headed, mulish people she’d ever had the displeasure to deal with and she’d dealt with the World Security Council. He seemed to think that changing your mind on even the smallest of things was tantamount to admitting you were stupid or some such rubbish, even when he presented with evidence _proving_ he was wrong. As a result, he was so resistant to changing his mind that talking to him felt like talking to a brick wall.

Beside her, Natasha gave an irritated huff. “She’s saying that SHIELD has been infiltrated and those people were trying to manipulate you into disliking Tony.”

They’d made a conscious effort to refer to Stark as Tony, to keep the name familiar and cozy, to _not_ use his last name since doing so was distancing. Thus far, it didn’t seem to be working.

“But the video…”

“Was not the one Fury had put together for you,” Maria said, curbing her tendency to impatience. This wasn’t the first time they’d had this conversation. Just when they thought they were getting somewhere, Rogers would backslide or they’d break for the night and find out the next morning that Rogers had seemingly forgotten everything they’d told him. Maria was starting to get worried… well, somewhere under her frustration and annoyance she was getting worried.

“Then it was all false?”

Maria struggled to refrain from sighing again. This was the sticking point they kept hitting with Rogers. The video he’d watched wasn’t false but it was very selectively edited to make Stark look like a feckless idiot. Fury’s video had included professional and academic presentations Stark had done and images of Stark the businessman. It had also included _some_ of Stark’s partyboy life to round it out and show he was not unlike Howard Stark when you got down to it, little though Stark would like that comparison.

But because they couldn’t say the original video footage Rogers had seen was fake, he seemed to believe it more than the video they’d shown him because that was the footage he’d seen first. It was that refusal to change his mind coming to the fore and making this an exquisite exercise in frustration to the point where Maria was tempted to test Rogers’ healing factor by either trying to strangle him or shooting him.

Thankfully, Natasha knew her well enough to know she was getting to the end of her tether and she took up the thread of the conversation.

“No, but it was very carefully edited to give you a false impression of the man,” Natasha said smoothly. “It would be like someone putting together a video of you but only when you were doing things wrong. What kind of impression would that create of you?”

That seemed to finally work its way through Rogers’ thick skull and a thoughtful expression settled on his face. Maria exchanged exasperated glances with Natasha then quickly wiped her face clean when Rogers focused on them again.

“So,” Rogers said slowly. “That video was sort of the modern equivalent of Howard with those…” He blushed and looked rather bashful and Maria could see how people fell for the Captain America schtick. “… er, ladies.”

“Something like that,” Natasha said with an encouraging smile. “But look at it this way. Whoever put that video together, whoever has infiltrated SHIELD, wanted to manipulate you. They wanted you to dislike Tony and refuse to work with him.” She cocked an eyebrow. “Now why would that be?”

Rogers frowned thoughtfully. “Because they think that if we worked together, we’d be a threat to them.”

Natasha waved her hands in a just-so gesture. “Exactly.”

Rogers continued to frown. “Let me see your video again.”

Maria quickly hit play on the laptop and let Rogers watch it. This time, they could see he was actually taking in what was on it, instead of dismissing it because it didn’t fit the preconceptions of the man that had been established by the first video. 

They’d had a psychiatrist come in the previous day to assess Rogers, though Rogers wasn’t aware that was who the man had been. Rogers had an entirely understandable suspicion of psychiatry in general so if they’d told him, he would have gotten defensive and perhaps even have refused to speak to the doctor. What they’d done was a little underhanded but they needed to get a handle on this before it blossomed into an uncontrollable problem and SHIELD had always leaned a little more towards the means justifying the ends in general.

The psychiatrist had sent his conclusions over last night and they… weren’t good. PTSD was a given but the sheer amount of dislocation and loss Rogers was feeling was definitely a surprise. Rogers seemed to almost have an aversion to the modern world and he’d apparently mentally dug in his heels about learning to adjust to what things were like now. In light of that, it was no wonder the video had made him baulk hard in the face of Tony Stark. The man was the present and the future personified. He must have been very intimidating to Rogers and Rogers was _not_ a man who reacted well to being intimidated.

And then Stark had refused to back down. What’s more, he’d called Rogers out on his behaviour then all but dismissed him. The trick to fixing this was getting Rogers to see that he’d been in the wrong and the first part of _that_ trick was getting Rogers to realise he’d misjudged Stark right from the very beginning.

“I don’t understand,” Roger said, dragging her attention back to what she was doing. “Why would he behave like… that when he can be like this?”

“All work and no play makes Tony a dull boy,” Natasha said almost playfully. “Besides, most of what you saw in that video had been highly edited. What you saw may have only been something that happened in fifteen minutes of a much longer event in which he was doing business.”

Rogers suddenly blushed. “But not the… er… “

“The sex tapes,” Natasha said bluntly, ignoring the way Rogers blushed and sputtered. “Those were largely set ups. Tony was taped without his knowledge and the tapes were released without his consent. People do that sometimes. Usually because they’re feeling entitled and the person they were with didn’t indulge them. In this case, these women wanted more than the single night Tony was willing to give them.” She shrugged. “Mostly, they wanted Tony’s money. The tapes were an attempt at blackmail.”

“Oh,” Rogers said and this time his look of disapproval didn’t seem to be aimed at Stark. Maria thought that alone was a major step forward and she appreciated the way Natasha had skilfully turned Rogers’ disapproval away from Stark. While normally she was a bit dubious about Natasha using her skills on people who were allies or friends, they were proving to be very useful in getting Rogers where they wanted him to be. “Why didn’t Tony do anything about them?”

Maria could have cheered at Rogers’ use of Tony’s first name. It was the first time she could remember him using it. It looked like they were finally starting to chisel away at the brick wall. She quickly curbed that feeling though. They’d thought that in the past and had it all come to naught.

Natasha chuckled. “Because… well, I won’t say he didn’t care but…” Her smile curled into something almost mischievous. “The videos did sort of backfire on the people who posted them. They meant to embarrass him. He refused to be embarrassed for their public entertainment and people who watched them were highly complimentary of his… performance.” She shrugged. “And if he’d made a fuss that would have just played into the hands of those who posted the videos. By ignoring them, he defused the situation somewhat.”

Maria watched Rogers carefully and again she got the distinct impression that the frown on his face wasn’t directed at Stark.

“So the people who posted those videos were punished?” he asked.

Natasha shrugged. “Not legally but they were tried and found wanting in the court of public opinion.” She paused and cocked her head slightly, giving Steve a knowing look. “I refuse to believe that you’re _that_ scandalised over the sex. I know people had sex back in the Forties.”

Rogers blushed and then gave her an exasperated look when she grinned. “It’s not that. It’s… I can’t believe anyone would _record_ something like that.”

Natasha nodded. “Most people don’t. Tony is a celebrity and he’s wealthy. That makes him a target for those who are out for a quick buck. I’d imagine Howard faced much the same thing, though probably not as bad because there wasn’t the technology there is these days. Also because Howard was mostly only famous in the United States. Tony is a global name.”

Now Rogers looked curious and Maria was relieved to see it. If Rogers was asking questions about Tony instead of just judging him, they could make some inroads into changing his mind.

“Tony took over after Howard died, didn’t he?”

Maria nodded, drawing Rogers’ attention back to her. “Yes, though not immediately. He was seventeen when his parents died in a car accident. Obadiah Stane took over as interim CEO until Tony turned twenty-one when the company became his.”

“That can’t have been easy.”

“No,” Maria said soberly. “Some of the worst of what you saw in that original video came in the first five to ten years after Howard and Maria Stark died. Tony… went a little off the rails in his grief, especially after Edwin and Ana Jarvis died a couple of years after Howard and Maria.” She saw the question on Rogers’ face and answered it before he could ask. “Edwin Jarvis was the Stark’s butler but he and his wife were essentially a surrogate uncle and aunt to Tony.”

Maria knew it was probably a bit more than that given what was written in the files they had on Stark but the subject of Howard’s abilities as a father… or lack thereof… were a bridge they didn’t need to cross right now.

“What happened after he took over Stark Industries?” Rogers asked.

“He revolutionised the company,” Maria replied. “He took it from being a multimillion dollar _national_ company to being a multibillion dollar _international_ company that currently employs, either directly or indirectly, an estimated 500,000 people worldwide. Even after he withdrew SI from its defence contracts and weapons manufacturing after Afghanistan, he continued to grow the company and in fact, its stock price is higher now than it ever was before and the company is now making more money than it ever did as a weapons manufacturer.”

Rogers nodded, looking thoughtful. “Afghanistan. I saw something about that in Tony’s file but there wasn’t a lot of detail.”

“He hasn’t given us much detail,” Natasha said dryly. “Most of what we know is what we’ve gathered on our own or extrapolated from what little he _has_ said about it.”

Rogers frowned. “Why wouldn’t he tell you?”

Natasha leaned back in her chair. “A lot of reasons, Steve, all of them understandable. But mostly? It was traumatic. You’ve seen the arc reactor in his chest, yes?” Rogers nodded and she continued. “That happened in Afghanistan. We’ve had some surgeons speculate on how it must have happened and their conclusions would make your hair stand on end.”

“They said that the… structure must go at least a couple of inches into Tony’s chest,” Maria added. “That there must be constant pressure on various muscles and bones and he’s probably suffering from chronic pain.” She paused and considered what to say. Everything they had about the arc reactor was speculation so she needed to be careful with what she told Rogers. “Whatever surgery was done to put it in there was done while he was being held by the Ten Rings. I… can’t imagine it was done in proper hospital conditions. The surgeons concluded that it was a miracle he didn’t die of some sort of post-operative infection.”

As she watched, Rogers shuddered and curled in on himself for a moment. She concluded he must have been remembering how things felt when he was small and asthmatic. No doubt he knew what it was like to have constant chest pain.

“That was where he built the first suit?” he asked.

Maria nodded. “And where he found out that someone inside SI was selling weapons under the table.”

“That was… Stane?”

“Correct. Obadiah Stane was the one who had Tony kidnapped and later tried to kill him by removing the arc reactor from his chest.”

“Stane was in the Ironmonger armour, correct?” Rogers’ frown was _definitely_ not directed at Stark now. “But he died.”

Maria nodded. “Yes. Tony fought him and ended up killing him when Stane forced him into a situation where he had no other choice.”

“That can’t have been easy,” Rogers said. “Didn’t you say Stane was the one who was in charge of SI after Tony’s parents died? They must have been close.”

Maria wanted to stand up and cheer. She also wanted to take Natasha out for a celebratory drink because her tactics were apparently working. They finally had Rogers thinking about Stark in a sympathetic way.

Natasha grimaced. “They were but when I reviewed a lot of the video of the two of them together… well, Stane was gaslighting him. I’ve used a lot of those tactics myself so I recognised them when I was actually looking for them.”

“Gaslighting?” Rogers said, looking confused.

“It’s a form of manipulation,” Natasha explained. “It involves using verbal and physical cues to… essentially make a person doubt their own version of events. It destabilises a person and makes them very malleable and easily manoeuvred into believing and doing what you want.”

“When we reviewed Stane’s behaviour in the wake of Afghanistan, we found evidence that Stane had been manipulating both Tony and Howard since Tony was a small child,” Maria added. “We suspect a lot of the leaks of… unflattering information about Tony was his doing and that he deliberately encouraged Tony into reckless and dangerous behaviour then did nothing to protect him from the inevitable public fallout. He essentially convinced Tony it was all his fault and since he’d gotten his claws into Tony from a very young age, Tony had no reason to even think that he was being manipulated and used.”

“Why didn’t Howard see that and put a stop to it?” Rogers said indignantly.

Maria and Natasha exchanged glances. “We don’t think he knew what was going on,” Maria explained. “His people skills weren’t great and Stane was very subtle.”

Natasha picked up the thread. “We also believe that Stane was… deliberately sowing discord between Tony and his father. We don’t know how far that went since most of it occurred when the cameras weren’t on them but… Howard consistently missed key moments in Tony’s life, which caused a lot of resentment in Tony. If you dig down, each time Howard missed a science fair or whatever Tony was doing, he was at Stark Industries attending to some conveniently timed problem. Now, some of them were probably genuine but they happened too consistently for it to be entirely coincidence.”

“Howard is… a sore point with Tony,” Maria added, realising they were going to have to get into Howard Stark’s fatherhood abilities after all. “The best way to get on his bad side is to compare him to his father.”

Rogers looked a little sad and indignant. “Howard was my friend.”

“He changed after the war,” Maria said. “Or perhaps because of the war. The Howard you knew and the Howard Tony knew were very different men.” She paused then continued delicately, “Howard became a heavy drinker after the war.”

She and Natasha exchanged glances. There had been a lot of debate about whether they should bring up Howard Stark’s obsession with finding Rogers and the effect that had on his relationship with Tony. Finally, they’d decided that they had to. Tony was likely to mention it, probably in an offhand, flippant manner that might put Rogers’ back up, so it was felt he was better off forewarned.

“He also spent a great deal of time looking for you,” Maria continued. “To the detriment of his relationship with his son.”

No one ever said Steve Rogers was stupid. Stubborn, certainly, but not stupid. From the look on his face, he got what Maria meant in a heartbeat.

“He put me ahead of his son?” Rogers shook his head with a frown. “I would never have wanted him to do that.” He sighed. “No wonder he hates me.”

Maria had to bite the inside of her cheek to swallow her response to that statement. Then she realised there probably was a fair amount of truth in it. There likely was a part of Stark that hated Steve Rogers as a by-product of his mixed feelings for his father. But she didn’t think that was the sum of Stark’s feelings, not based on what Fury had reported to them after his meeting with Stark at his tower.

“You didn’t exactly help your cause with him with everything you said to him on the helicarrier,” Natasha said calmly.

Steve frowned but then he sighed. “I… you’re right. I was an ass. I heard Stark and expected Howard and… I wasn’t fair to Tony.”

Maria wanted to get up and do a triumphant dance and from the look in Natasha’s eyes when they exchanged a glance, she did too.

“I should apologise to him,” Steve continued. 

“That would probably be a good idea,” Maria said as blandly as she could manage. “He’s offered to let you come and stay at the Tower. He’s going to be running the Avengers from there, at least for now. I don’t know if he has any plans to create a dedicated base for them.”

“Tony’s running the Avengers?” Steve said with a small frown.

Maria nodded. “Fury thought it best. While he doesn’t have the field experience that you do, he does have extensive experience in leadership and he has the diplomatic, political and legal connections that the Avengers are going to need.” She straightened and hoped she could deliver this next bit in the right way. “Fury’s hoping that you and Tony can eventually become co-leaders of the Avengers. He thinks your respective skills and abilities could balance out the other’s weak points.”

Steve looked like he was going to protest but then he settled into a thoughtful silence. “Tony handled the invasion well,” he finally said. “And we definitely worked well together in the battle.”

“But you have a lot of catching up to do before you can really think about taking on any permanent leadership role,” Natasha said smoothly. “The world has changed a lot since you were last awake. Some good, some bad but most of it somewhere in between.”

Steve looked a little overwhelmed. “Seventy years is a lot…”

Maria got up and walked over to where she’d left her bag when she’d come in after meeting Fury. She pulled out a thin tablet and brought it back, offering it to Steve. “Tony put this together for you. He’s done his best to make it easy to use at first and to guide you into how to use the more advanced features. He’s also put…” She sighed and shook her head but didn’t try and hide the smile that tugged at the edges of her lips. “He’s put together a ‘Steve Roger’s Guide to the 20th and 21st Century’ for you.”

“Uh, are we sure that’s wise?” Natasha said, letting herself sound very droll. “He hasn’t just filled that thing with episodes of Gilligan’s Island and called them documentaries, has he?”

Maria chucked and though Steve looked confused by the reference, he seemed to get the humour in it as well judging by the small smile that appeared on his face.

“No, I think it was more JARVIS than Tony,” she replied. “He showed it to me and… it’s good.” She turned back to Steve. “It breaks everything down into decades and gives an overview of all the main global geopolitical and cultural events that occurred in that decade. You can then dig down into years, topics or places. Everything starts with a general overview and gives you the ability to seek further detail as you wish. They’ve tried to break everything down into digestible bits instead of overwhelming you with cascades of information all at once.”

Steve took the tablet a little gingerly and looked down at it “I’m always worried I’m going to break things like this.”

Natasha grinned at him. “I wouldn’t worry. Firstly, that’s a Stark tablet. It’s built to be strong. Secondly, even if you did break it, Tony’s more likely to flail excitedly and then drag you off into his lab to find out how and why you broke it so he can make it better.”

Steve chuckled softly and turned the tablet over in his hands. He poked at the screen and when it activated, he looked at what was on there with interest. “Okay. And if I have questions…?”

“I’ll be around,” Natasha said easily.

Maria nodded. “I’ll be in and out and I’m sure Tony’s put some way in there of contacting him as well.”

She knew it was a bit of a risk telling Steve that. They’d made some good strides today but she’d thought that in the past, only to find that Steve had backslid during the night for some unknown reason.

Steve nodded. “Okay.”

Maria got to her feet and brushed her hands against her trousers. “Look, let’s leave it there for the day. We’ve covered a lot more than I thought we would and your head must be swimming with all that new information. Why don’t you sleep on it, play around with Stark’s tablet and we’ll talk more in the morning?”

Steve had risen to his feet when she had and he smiled and nodded. “Okay. That’d be good. Thank you, Maria.”

Maria nodded and did her best to make her smile genuine. She’d wait for the morning and see whether they were going to have to rehash everything they’d discussed today again or whether they would finally move on to other subjects.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha checks in with Clint, Tony is sleep-deprived and JARVIS doesn't like supervillianry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've come straight to this chapter, you might want to go back one. I put up two chapters at once. :D

Natasha looked around the designated Avengers’ common floor with well-disguised interest. She hadn’t had much of a chance to come to the Tower but she’d been told she had a place to stay here when she wanted it. Clint had emailed her a few times and had waxed rhapsodic about the apartment Tony had given him. Though apparently ‘floor’ might be a better term to use than apartment given Clint had talked about having an archery range on his floor.

“Hey, Tash.”

Clint leaned over the back of the couch where he was watching some sort of cartoon and grinned at her. She was almost surprised to see that. Clint… hadn’t been in a good place the last time she’d actually seen him and she’d expected him to be moping still. But then, he had mentioned that he’d been talking to Stella in his emails, which had surprised her. Clint was usually pragmatic enough to know _when_ he needed therapy but he generally didn’t have the patience to see it through long enough for it to be worthwhile.

She smiled as she walked into the living room. “Hey, Clint. Where’s Stark?”

“Tony’s down in his amazing lab of doom,” Clint replied. 

Natasha raised one eyebrow delicately. “Lab of doom?”

“Have you seen it?” Clint said enthusiastically. “All he needs is the volcano and he could be the most badass supervillain.”

“I think we’d prefer to avoid that, Agent Barton,” came a smooth, very British voice from the speaker in the ceiling.

“That’s JARVIS,” Clint said, gesturing towards the ceiling with a thumb. “He’s gets all snippy when I try and push Tony down the path to supervillianry.”

“It’s not that, Agent Barton,” JARVIS said dryly. “It’s just thinking of all the damage Sir would do with a volcano that I would be required to clean up.”

Clint snickered then did a small backflip over the back of the couch. “So what’s up? I thought you were off with Captain America.”

Natasha rolled her eyes and let herself collapse onto one of the bar stools nearby. “Maria’s given me the day off because apparently I was starting to get a homicidal glint in my eyes.”

“You always have a homicidal glint in your eyes.”

“It was getting obvious enough that she was afraid Rogers would notice.”

“Ouch.” Clint wandered into the kitchen and jumped up to sit on the bench. “That bad, huh?”

“Remember when you made me watch Groundhog Day?”

Clint nodded. “Sure.”

Natasha rolled her eyes. “It’s a bit like that. Only far less entertaining. Every time we think we’ve got him to take a step forward, we wake up the next morning and find he’s taken two steps backwards.”

“Yikes,” Clint said then he turned when the lift doors opened and a somewhat bleary-eyed Tony stepped out.

“JARVIS said we had a guest,” Tony said, running a hand through his hair. His gaze, though slightly sleepy, still focused quickly on Natasha. “Oh, hey, Natashalie.”

Natasha sighed. “I’m… never going to live that down, am I?”

Tony smirked as he wandered into the kitchen and started up the coffee machine. “Nope. That profile sucked.”

“It was Fury’s orders,” she said tartly.

“Fury needs to learn there’s better ways than manipulating people,” Tony countered.

Natasha smirked. “I think his head would explode if he tried that.”

Tony snorted with amusement then glared at the coffee machine as if that would make it work faster. “So… in the interests of me casa es su casa, you have a room here.”

Clint snorted. “And by room, he means floor.”

“Eh,” Tony said with a shrug. “It’s not like I don’t have the space and might as well start as we mean to go on.” His gaze focused surprisingly sharply on Natasha again. “That is… if you’re in.”

“I’m in,” Natasha replied. “Though I’m not sure Rogers will be any time soon.”

A complicated little run of emotions flickered across Tony’s face and Natasha would admit to being intrigued. This Tony Stark was a lot different from the one she’d met when she’d infiltrated Stark Industries and she was beginning to get a feel for how badly the palladium poisoning had been affecting the man. In fact, she had a sneaking suspicion that if it had been anyone else, they’d have been flat out in a hospital bed, not gallivanting around the way Stark had been. She’d be annoyed at herself for being fooled but… she wasn’t sure how much of what she’d seen had been an act and how much had actually been erratic behaviour caused by the poisoning. She may not have been entirely wrong in her assessment, she just hadn’t taken into account the circumstances and context nor had she had a baseline of Tony’s normal behaviour to work from.

“That bad, huh?” Tony said, echoing Clint’s words from earlier.

“He seems determined not to change his mind,” Natasha said. “We get him halfway convinced during the day then overnight he backslides and we’re back to square one.”

“That’s… odd,” Tony replied, the weariness he’d been exhibiting sloughing away. “I mean, once or twice, sure, but… every night?”

Natasha’s lips quirked in an appreciative smile at Tony’s quick grasp of the situation. “That’s what’s worrying us. But we’re in a safe house, off the grid, and the only people who come and go are vetted by Fury himself. If someone’s influencing him, neither Maria nor I can figure out how they’re doing it.”

“Huh,” Tony said. “That’s weird.”

“We whittled down our initial suspicions to post-hypnotic suggestion or some sort of electronic interference, though we didn’t exactly decide on what kind.” She shrugged, looking rather wry. “We were scraping the barrel and hoping not to have to admit that he’s just that damn stupid because if he is, there’s nothing we can really do about it.”

“You want one of the SI jammers?” Tony offered, clearly deciding to leave the last bit of what she’d said alone. “We’ve got the standard one or if you give me a few hours I could probably soup one of them up.”

“Sir,” JARVIS said with some exasperation. “You have not slept in forty-three hours. You would be far more effective if you got some rest first.” 

Clint snickered and Natasha rolled her eye. “I’ll take a standard one, Stark. Who knows what you’d come up with when you’re sleep deprived. I don’t need an exploding jammer.”

Tony opened his mouth to protest but then he shrugged and smiled wryly. “Eh, you may have a point there. I do my best engineering under pressure but also some of my weirdest. J? Can you have a jammer sent up for Natasha?”

“Of course, sir,” JARVIS replied. “May I suggest you seek your bed, sir, instead of more coffee?”

Tony looked longingly at the coffee machine. “But… coffee!” he whined.

Clint’s snickering turned into outright laughter and he opened the fridge. He pulled out a cupcake and shoved it into Tony’s hand. “Here. Have a coffee cupcake. There’s coffee and food all in one and it won’t keep you awake.”

Tony sighed and took a bite. “Umph. Good,” he said, his voice muffled. He then waved a hand. “Going to bed.”

Natasha watched him wander out to the lift as he argued with JARVIS. She then turned to Clint and arched an eyebrow at him. “You’re baking.”

“I could have bought that,” he said defensively.

“Sure but that’s one of yours,” she replied. “You don’t know how to make much but you do make a mean cupcake.”

Clint shrugged. “Nightmares.”

Natasha nodded in understanding. Clint had always hated just lying around when he had nightmares. He’d rather get up and do something – shoot arrows, work out, clean, bake – it didn’t matter what, just as long as he could not think about the nightmare for a while.

“I thought you were seeing Stella,” she said.

“I am but…” Clint shuddered. “This is… different, Tash.” He drew in a breath and changed the subject. “So Cap’s being a dick?”

“Maybe,” Natasha replied with a grimace. “We’d like to think it was something being imposed on him but… I’m not so sure.”

“Has Fury figured out what’s going on in SHIELD?” Clint asked. “Might be related?”

Natasha nodded. “Yeah, that’s our thought as well but he’s moving slowly because he wants to get the whole infection at one go. My guess is he’ll send word to Stark once he’s ready to move so that Stark can protect you and Banner.” She arched an eyebrow. “Also, what’s this I hear about you blackmailing Stark into therapy?”

Clint was well used to Natasha’s abrupt changes of subject as a way of getting information out of people so he didn’t really react.

“I didn’t blackmail him into therapy,” he said calmly. “I said that since we were both going to be Avengers, if I went, so should he.” He shrugged. “He’d already admitted he probably needed therapy but he didn’t trust anyone not to betray him.”

“It’s happened in the past,” Natasha said with a nod.

“Yeah, he said.” Clint climbed into the stool next to Natasha’s. “Anyway, he’s been talking to Stella. I have no idea how it’s going though.”

“I think it must be going well,” Natasha said thoughtfully as she considered Stark and his behaviour from just before. “He’s certainly nowhere near as erratic as he was last time I was around him.”

“Tash,” Clint said, looking dubious. “Last time you were around him, he was suffering from heavy metal poisoning. I’m not sure that’s a good comparison.”

Natasha sighed and poured herself a cup of coffee from the pot Tony had been preparing. “I know.” She scowled. “Ugh! I’m better than that. How did I miss _everything_?”

“You thought the job was beneath you,” Clint replied then when Natasha glared at him, he continued, “Don’t scowl at me. You did! You told me so yourself. You asked me why you were being sent to babysit a billionaire brat.”

Natasha sighed. “Okay, _fine_.”

“Also you’d been out of the country for six months on one hell of a shit assignment and really wanted a couple of weeks to rest, sleep and get your equilibrium back but instead you got sent to babysit a billionaire brat who also happened to be dying.” Clint shrugged. “You weren’t exactly at your best. And don’t scowl at me about that either. You know I’m right. I said something to Phil but either he didn’t listen or Fury didn’t listen.”

Natasha grumbled then sighed again. “I know.”

“So,” Clint said, jumping down from his stool. “Wanna see your floor? It’ll be cool.”

Natasha smiled at seeing Clint looking so relaxed despite the nightmares. “Sure.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> *emerges from the wilds and throws another chapter of this one at you*
> 
> I feel like this fic could be renamed 'How do solve a problem like Steve', sung more or less to the tune from the Sound of Music. Except possibly not because I don't have enough syllables to play with in the name to make it fit the tune. How about 'How do you solve a problem like Steve Rogers'?

“Hey, Brucie bear,” Tony said as he sauntered into the lab he’d set for Bruce.

His fellow scientist looked up from his microscope with the absent-minded expression and half-hearted ‘Hmm?’ that was so familiar to every scientist everywhere and Tony waited the requisite amount of time required for Bruce to drag his brain back from whatever problem he was working on and into the here and now.

“Oh! Hey, Tony. What was that?”

Tony grinned. “Got something I want you to have a look at when you have the time?”

Bruce raised an eyebrow. “Avengers related or just for fun?”

“It can’t be both?” Tony grinned then he sobered. “Actually, Avengers stuff.”

Bruce nodded and set aside the sample he had been looking at. “What’s up?”

Tony waved a couple of screens to life and data and files began appearing on them. “Fury dug up everything on SHIELD’s servers regarding Rogers and the super soldier serum. He looked kind of disturbed when he handed it over…” He paused. “Well, slightly dyspeptic actually but I’m pretty sure that’s his disturbed expression. And frankly I don’t blame him. Some of this information… I’m not sure how they got their hands on it and there is _definitely_ something weird going on over there…”

“Tony?” Bruce said with patient amusement. “Focus.”

“Right,” Tony said, hauling himself back on track. “Anyway, Natasha and Hill are having difficulties with Steve and they want to know if it might be the serum and since you’re our resident expert in the serum, I figure I’d ask you.”

Bruce grimaced. “My track record isn’t that great actually.”

“You’re sane and alive,” Tony replied. “That puts you miles ahead of anyone else.”

Bruce conceded the point with a shrug. “So what’s going on with Steve?”

“They’re trying to show him I’m not the devil incarnate,” Tony replied. “But every time they think they’ve got him halfway convinced, he backslides overnight.”

“Every time?” Bruce said with surprise.

“Yup.” Tony shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back and forth on his heels. “Natasha sent over some video footage as an example of what’s going on.”

Bruce frowned as he started to sort out what they had. “Have they had him looked at by a psychiatrist?”

“Yeah, they did it once behind his back.” Tony rolled his eyes when Bruce frowned. “Yeah, I know. SHIELD has some problems when it comes to the whole gaining consent first thing.” He rubbed at his neck with one hand. “I think I still have a bruise from Natashalie’s effort.”

Bruce shot an amused look. “I’m sure you don’t, Tony. I’m gathering they’ve done something officially now?”

Tony nodded. “Apparently it was a bit rocky at first until they convinced Steve that they didn’t think he was crazy, that psych evals are pretty standard these days. Then they had to do it again the next day when the shrink came back.” He waved a hand at the screens. “The shrink’s report is in all of that. As are the MRI, X-rays and CT scans he ordered.”

“He thought it might be physical?”

Tony shrugged. “I think he wasn’t entirely sure what was going on and decided to cover all his bases.”

“Not a bad idea,” Bruce murmured. “Leave this with me, Tony. I’ll see what I can do.” He raised an eyebrow at his fellow scientists. “Unless you want to help?”

Tony grimaced. “The squishy sciences aren’t really my forte but if there’s anyone you think might be able to help, I can see if they can be convinced to come?”

Bruce hesitated then looked away, Tony waited him out and had to control the urge to babble something inane when Bruce looked back at him with a wealth of pain in his eyes.

“There… may be someone but it might not be safe…”

“Brucie bear, you are _not_ a danger…”

“Not me,” Bruce said, giving Tony an apologetic look of his interruption. “Her father hates me and would use any excuse to try and… capture me.”

Tony’s eyes narrowed. “You mean, Dr Elizabeth Ross? And good ol’ Thunderbolt?”

Bruce nodded and fiddled with the end of his sleeves. “Betty was part of the… uh, experiment that turned me into the Hulk. But Ross is…”

“A pain in everyone’s ass?” Tony suggested with a smirk. He waved a hand. “Don’t worry about him, green bean. I can handle Ross. If you want Dr Ross’ help, I’ll contact her.”

Bruce hesitated then nodded. “Yeah… I mean, if she’s willing.”

“I’ll ask,” Tony said. “I promise I’ll ask and not just whisk her away to the wonderful world of science.”

Bruce managed a small smile. “Betty might not object to that actually.”

“Sounds like my kind of girl,” Tony said then he held up his hands in a surrendering gesture, a grin playing across his lips. “But not my kind of girl at all. Pepper is my kind of girl.”

Bruce sighed and gave him a fond look. “You’re ridiculous, Tony.”

Tony laughed. “So they tell me. Okay, Betty Ross. Anything else that might help?”

“There’s…” Bruce hesitated then shook his head like his was shaking away an errant thought. “There’s a locker in the Atocha train station in Madrid, number 56A. The combination is 67643. Everything I was able to take with me regarding what we did is in there.”

“I’ll get it,” Tony replied.

“I mean… Betty’s probably got copies but…” Bruce broke off and took his glasses off, polishing them on his shirt.

Tony put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed gently. “Leave it with me, Bruce. I’ll take care of it.”

Bruce raised his head and smiled wryly. “Thank you.”

Tony shifted a little awkwardly, unused to having someone thank him for something so simple. “Uh, hey,” he said, trying to ignore the fond look Bruce was giving him. “Natasha’s here for a bit. Wanna come up and meet her in less dire and world-ending circumstances? We can order in and watch a movie or something.”

“Team building?” Bruce said.

Tony shrugged. “More or less. We’re supposed to be a team and that means more than just suiting up with the bad guys arrive.”

“Okay,” Bruce said. “Let me get started with this and then I’ll come up.”

Tony waved a hand and headed out.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony meets Betty and they _bond_. (Bruce is facepalming at the very idea.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Would you believe I had forgotten I hadn't posted this chapter? Ooops!

The house Tony pulled up in front of was very ordinary. In fact, it was about as ordinary a house and as ordinary a neighbourhood as he’d ever seen… except for the black van sitting rather inconspicuously about four doors down. He got out of his car and waved at the men in the van and watched as one of them immediately got on the phone.

“J?” Tony said, knowing his earpiece would pick up his voice.

“Diverting the call now, sir,” JARVIS said.

“Thanks, J,” Tony replied. He swallowed his grin since he knew that he’d have to deal with old Thunderbolt eventually but at least this way, he had a fair chance of convincing Betty to join them before her old man could stick his big fat nose into things.

He wasn’t surprised to see the front door of the house open before he even got to it and the woman standing there was looking at him with a mix of suspicion and worry.

“Mr Stark,” she said in a neutral tone.

“Dr Ross,” he replied with a grin. “I come bearing messages from a good friend of yours. One with a large, green, anger management problem.”

Betty looked hopeful for a moment before the neutral expression returned. She hesitated for a moment before gesturing for him to enter. Once the door was closed, she held up one hand and grimaced before pointing to the lamp. Tony frowned for a moment then he grinned. He pulled out his phone and tapped a few instructions into it.

“The coast is clear, sir,” JARVIS said after a couple of minutes. “They will hear nothing.”

“Is Bruce alright?” Betty said immediately, clearly willing to trust him.

“Green bean is fine,” Tony said and internally delighted at the smile that quirked at Betty’s lips at the nickname. “Worries a bit too much about the big guy and good old Thunderbolt but he’s busy sciencing with me at Stark Tower at the moment. I gave him a lab.” He grinned at her. “There’s one for you too, if you want it.” He winked. “Or you could share with Brucie bear.”

His grin widened as he watched a myriad of expressions run across her face, practically waving placards. She finally settled on looking hopeful and slightly confused and worried.

“My father…” she began.

Tony waved a hand. “I’ve been itching to take him down for years.”

“Mr Stark…”

“Call me Tony, Dr Ross.”

“Tony,” Betty said firmly. “Firstly, please call me Betty. Secondly, I don’t want you to underestimate the General. He has me watched constantly. I don’t want to put Bruce in danger.”

Tony quirked an eyebrow at that nomenclature then he sobered and dropped the flippant attitude. “You won’t,” he said seriously. “I’ve been gathering evidence against him for years and even more so since the invasion. I don’t want to put Brucie bear in danger either so if that means I have to take down Thunderbolt, I will.”

Betty stared at him, hope warring with scepticism on her face. “Can you really do that?”

Tony’s smile was cold and sharp. “Betty, I used to be right in the middle of the military industrial complex. Hell, I practically used to _be_ the military industrial complex. I know a _lot_ of secrets and the ones I don’t know, I know who _does_ know them. I’ve also got a super secret spy organisation that dislikes Ross as much as I do and will be happy to help me take him down.”

Betty looked startled and he saw the realisation cross her face that he used to be called the Merchant of Death and that maybe, just maybe, there had been a _reason_ for that beyond the mere manufacture of weapons.

“You can really make sure he won’t hurt Bruce?”

Tony nodded. “Absolutely.”

The smile he got in return was blinding and Betty quickly darted off. “Let me pack a few things,” she said over her shoulder as she disappeared further into the house. She had just returned with a large carry-all in one hand when Tony’s phone suddenly started playing the Grinch song. He smirked at Betty and answered it.

“Hey, Thunderbritches. How’s it hanging?”

Betty’s eyes widened but he was too busy listening to Ross bluster and try to yell at him. He let the man get it out of his system then he cleared his throat.

“Now, Thaddeus, up until now I’ve been a friendly man,” he said in a voice that was deceptively calm, something which Ross must have realised because there was a sudden silence on the other end of the phone. “Apart from buying and demolishing your favourite bar, I’ve left you alone. I haven’t come after you. I haven’t targeted you.” He paused and when he continued, his tone was ice cold. “I haven’t burned your career to the ground, which we both know I could do in a heartbeat.”

“What are you talking about?” Ross growled.

Tony chuckled. It wasn’t a pleasant sound. “We both know you have a lot of secrets that if they were revealed would ensure that you spent the rest of your life in a hole so deep you’d never see sunlight.”

There was some more pointless blustering from the other end of the phone but Tony didn’t really pay attention. He could hear the one thing Ross was trying to hide – fear. That thin thread of fear was so obvious in Ross’ voice and Tony smiled coldly.

“Shut up, Thaddeus.” A shocked silence fell at the other end. “Now here’s what we’re going to do. You’re going to leave Bruce alone. You’re going to leave Betty alone. You’re going to toe the line and be a good little soldier. If you do that, well, maybe you’ll get that next promotion and have a nice long, successful life. If you don’t…” He let his voice reflect the coldness of his smile. “I will _personally_ make sure that the only job you will ever be able to get will be as a janitor in an abattoir.”

There was almost an entire minute of silence. “You can’t do that,” Ross said, his voice hoarse and shocked.

“Try me, Thunderhead,” Tony replied menacingly. “Just try me.”

There was silence again and Tony didn’t bother waiting to see what Ross might say next, he simply hung up the phone. “JARVIS?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Send Ross a little taster of what we have on him, will you? Very private, self-destruct in 20 minutes, all that sort of jazz.”

“Of course, sir. I’ll even play the Mission: Impossible music as I do so.”

“Such sass,” Tony said with a small smile. “I don’t know where you get it from.”

“It’s a mystery, sir.”

Tony chuckled and let JARVIS get to work. He looked over at Betty and grinned at her. “Convinced?”

Betty laughed, a light, happy, airy sound that Tony got the feeling she hadn’t made in a very long time. “Yes, I think I am. I’ve never seen anyone take on the General like that and win before.”

Tony shrugged and smiled ruefully as he ushered her to the door and towards his car. “I don’t do it very often. I don’t actually _like_ doing it really. But I learned well. A bit from Dad but mostly from Obie. There are times when you put the kid gloves on and walk delicately and there are times when you unleash the dogs.”

Betty waited until they were in the car before she answered. “Everyone tends to forget that you ran Stark Industries for twenty years.”

Tony shrugged. “Obie did a lot of it but… well, yeah, most of the decisions came to me eventually.” He felt Betty’s gaze resting him on him and he chuckled. “And now you’re wondering why I let the predominant view of me be the slutty party boy.”

“It is… a bit strange,” Betty said. “You’re so much more than that.”

Tony’s smile was a little awkward as it always was when someone gave him genuine praise with no expectations behind it. “It was… tactical.”

Betty frowned. “Tactical?”

“Do you know how many times I was kidnapped when I was a kid?”

Betty spluttered for a moment, her eyes wide. “ _Kidnapped_? What?”

“Twelve times up until I went to MIT,” Tony said soberly. “Of that only the first couple got any media attention.”

“ _Why_ don’t people know?” Betty said, sounding appalled.

“Because I wasn’t anything special,” Tony said with a shrug as he manoeuvred them onto the highway and headed for the airport. “People knew I was smart but they didn’t know exactly how smart. All they knew was that Dad was rich and then I was just one more rich boy of no great significance.”

“So where does the party boy thing come in?” Betty said, still sounding disturbed, though Tony didn’t know if it was at the number of kidnappings or his blasé attitude towards them.

“I got kidnapped _once_ at MIT,” Tony said. “And it was the first one that hit the news since I was a kid. And the reason it hit the news? A combination of Rhodey looking out for my idiotic ass and the other kids at MIT _talking_ about it enough that the media paid attention.” He snorted. “Dad still didn’t pay the ransom but the FBI got involved and that made the kidnappers twitchy enough that I was able to escape.”

Betty started nodding slowly, comprehension dawning on her face. “If everyone knows right away that you’ve been kidnapped, the police will get involved, the FBI, everyone.”

“Rich white party boy gets kidnapped and the shit immediately hits the fan? That makes kidnapping less desirable,” Tony said. “Rich white boy gets kidnapped and the parents want to keep things under wraps? The kidnappers suddenly have power they should never have been given.”

“And it works?”

“Up until Afghanistan it did,” Tony replied. “It kind of helped that Rhodey was a real mama bear at MIT and it got even easier after I hired Happy.”

“So there was method in your madness,” Betty said with a smile.

Tony laughed. “There usually is.”

Betty settled back in her seat and bit her lip. “So…” She drew in a breath. “How is Bruce? I saw the Hulk in the footage from New York and… he was _helping_.”

“Eh, the big guy isn’t so bad,” Tony said with a grin. “Now I’ve just got to convince Bruce of that.”

Betty winced and sighed. “That… might be because of what happened when the Hulk made his first appearance. He was scared and when people started shooting, he got angry and he… accidentally hurt me. Bruce has never forgiven himself for that.”

“I wondered whether it might be something along those lines,” Tony said, nodding slightly. “I think he’s been selling the Hulk short though. He certainly played nicely with all of us and took Steve’s orders well enough.” He laughed. “Though admittedly, Steve kept the orders nice and simple and exactly what the Hulk wanted – smash.”

“But it was controlled smashing,” Betty said.

“Yep.” Tony laughed again. “There’s a building full of people who think the Hulk is the greatest thing since sliced bread even though a few of them got injured when they didn’t get out of his way fast enough. But he saved them from one of the space whale things. Came charging through, leapt out the window and yanked the whale thing away. It had been heading straight for them.”

He paused as they went through all the security rigmarole it took to get through the airport gates and over to the hanger where his private plane was waiting. Once they were sitting down and the plane was taxiing out onto the runway, he picked up the conversation.

“And the big guy saved my life,” he said soberly.

Betty smiled. “I’ve seen the footage of him catching you.”

“Oh, it gets better,” Tony said with a grin. “According to the suit readings, I was in a pretty precarious state. My arc reactor was flickering and my heart wasn’t beating properly. I’d just stopped breathing too. And I was with the three worst people to have around under those circumstances. The alien god, the man from the 40s and the Hulk… none of whom know CPR.”

Betty winced. “But you’re okay now.”

Tony gave her a grin so full of mischief that she began smiling involuntarily. “The Hulk roared me back to life. I mean, you’ve heard the Hulk roar. Wouldn’t you climb out of your death bed if he was directing that at you?”

Betty looked slightly horrified but she was also laughing. “Yes, I imagine I would.” 

Tony laughed then directed the conversation back to the Hulk. There were questions he’d had since he’d first seen the footage from Culver University and now seemed the perfect time to ask them and it would certainly make the flight go faster.


End file.
